Turning Tides.

For a while now, I have dealt with paralysing negativity in my life. It’s in fact, infected my life for years and is, what I believe, part of the cause for my depression because I have adopted these negative thoughts, comments and beliefs to become part of me.

I do a fair bit of reading with regards to positive reinforcement and making people feel good about themselves for my work – I work with people who really have hit their lowest points, and sometimes, all they need is someone to say the right thing and make them believe that change is around the corner. Sometimes it works, but sometimes it falls on deaf ears, and that the same for everyone. We are all more accepting of negativity than we are of positive affirmation.

Now, my circle of friends is extremely small, and with passing years, I feel like it is getting smaller, so external affirmation becomes a rarer thing for me. That’s not to say the people in my life don’t provide it, although I think sometimes they do take it for granted and don’t give it purely because they forget that everyone needs it.

I like to give affirmation to others, but more increasingly I do it to my own detriment. I’m not going to be the type of stone-cold person who stops affirming others in order to get it for myself. No, far from it. My new habit is to be the following:

Write down a negative thought that comes into my head and plagues me

Write down two positive things I can learn and aim for, from that negative thing

It’s all about turning the negatives into positives but not in such a way as to just reword the sentence. Instead, it’s to visualise a goal and write statements that will be the results.

Fair enough, my first one is about my weight and insecurity, and I am battling that on all fronts. A lot has changed over the last two weeks to really kick me up the arse and get on with it, rather than just keep planning on it. Nothing bad has happened though, it’s all good and positive, which is what is driving this positive mindset that I find myself in.

It is however, quite liberating to write down the negatives. It got it out of my head and now I can focus on the future and overcoming it.